


peace, he begged

by hyacinth4maria



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: FOUND FAMILY BITCHES, Fluff, Happy Harry Potter, M/M, Professor Harry Potter, Ron Weasle being beautiful and amazing and the best friend ever, Some angst, after the war, also ron and hermione are better off as frenz, and more - Freeform, but ron and harry wudlv been so good to e/o as lovers, for like two seconds but still - Freeform, harry getting the peace he deserves, harry was better off as a teacher and i will fite ppl on this, hermione is out there rebuilding the wizarding the world for the better, ik not all friendships should be romanticized and there exists love within a platonic relationship, this is really self-indulgent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-13
Updated: 2020-05-13
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:42:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24170764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hyacinth4maria/pseuds/hyacinth4maria
Summary: Harry is tired. He is tired of the fights and the mysteries. He is tired of the blood and the scars. He is tired of struggling to live.He is tired, and that is the simple truth.(Harry finds his peace.)
Relationships: Harry Potter/Ron Weasley
Comments: 20
Kudos: 189





	peace, he begged

The countless battles Harry has fought have left him tired.

His mind screams with a constant agony. When he closes his eyes, he can hear the cries of all those he didn't save. He mistakes everything as a threat, he finds himself startling at small sounds. He finds himself feeling sorrow at the most random of moments. He finds himself lost, wandering around the Burrow aimlessly, months after having overstayed his visit.

He finds himself tired.

But the truth is he has been tired for years now.

His body drags on because it knows no other way. His heart beats because it has forgotten how to rest.

But Harry is so terribly tired.

On the days when the ache of loss is so overwhelming that his bones shake with remembrance, Harry looks desperately for a solace.

It seems odd and sudden, but one summer day, not unlike the others, Harry finds a solace.

Harry finds solace in the dip of a familiar, pale and freckled collarbone. Harry finds momentary ecstasy at the sight of a curved, valiant smirk. A smirk that speaks of survival and life.

Harry finds solace in his oldest friend. He finds solace in his first friend. In the boy that taught him of the wizarding world, the boy who rescued him and laughed with him and held him.

He finds solace in the boy with hair like fire and a soul to match.

Harry doesn't know what to do from then on.

The exact moment he finds himself feeling well and whole and not at all miserable, he startles violently.

He leaves at once. He leaves his best friend laying there in the open field behind the Burrow, with his mouth agape and eyebrows furrowed.

Harry can't make sense of his revelation. He feels a familiar sensation beginning to turn his bones to mush.

He is in love.

With Ronald Weasly, no less.

Harry had thought that he had squashed down all his past feelings for Ron long ago. Alas, they have arisen anew.

Time and time again, he has found himself slipping for Ron.

Ron with his lively eyes and his boisterous laugh. Ron, so sly and so abrasive all at once. Ron as he swallows down a breakfast twice his weight. Ron as he flies through the air, careless as the wind caresses his body. Ron, running across a battlefield, fighting with every last ounce of his energy. Ron, sleeping in a dirty tent, young and tired and perpetually afraid.

Time and time again, Harry has had to push these feelings down.

They never stay gone for long.

When Ron invites him to stay at the Burrow while they recover from a war which they had been fighting since childhood, he says it as if it weren't an invitation, rather a declaration.

Ron had said, with his voice sore and scratchy from all the hours he'd sobbed and screamed, "Harry, come to Burrow with me."

Harry had planned to stay at Hogwarts, to live with the ghosts and help repair the old school that had failed him security when he needed it most. He had hoped to pretend that he did not have an ancient and noble home that belonged to him now, he wanted to pretend that he hadn't lost his family, that he didn't have an Auror training to get to, and that he was only Harry Potter, a former Hogwarts student.

Then he sees Ron's face. Ron with his steady voice despite his bloodshot eyes. His mouth set tight into a straight line, so unlike the smile of his childhood.

Harry had no answer to give him other than yes, because he will always cave to Ron.

So, he leaves Hogwarts. He leaves all his immediate troubles behind with it.

For a terrible month, he considers joining the Aurors.

For that terrible month, he helps Molly Weasley with the cleaning and the rebuilding, the gardening, and the sewing. He becomes Molly's second in command around the house.

Ron had left for the Aurors, Ginny had joined the Holyhead Harpies, George is working himself away at the shop. Bill was enjoying his newfound family, Percy was worming his way through the government, Charlie was back in Romania, finding new dragons to heal. They were all tending to their careers now that they could do nothing with the mess that has become of their lives.

The Weasley siblings may seem different, all of them are constantly at odds with each other, but when it comes down to it, they all have survival engrained into their DNA. They know to push through their own pain and force themselves to live on.

Harry is not a Weasley, but he comes damn close.

In the early mornings, he helps Molly clean the house, not with magic as Molly had tried to teach him, but manually. Scrubbing restlessly at toilets and washing dishes and mopping floors. 

Afternoon, he apparates to Hogwarts and helps repair. Harry learns spells which mend walls once torn apart and learns how to coax the spirit back into them. 

In the evenings, he helps Molly cook dinner. Harry had never known he could cook without feeling like a servant. 

Harry spends time after dinner in Ron's room, trading quiet stories of the day, sharing dreams and nightmares, and sometimes, sharing tears.

In the nights, he will read, anything and everything, until he tires himself to the point of sleep. On the nights when the day has been particularly hard and tiring and he feels he might have a particularly terrible nightmare, the kind where he turns his room into a hurricane and screams bloody murder till Ron has to wake him, he downs a Dreamless Sleep potion and awaits the morning. When he runs out of Dreamless Sleep, he will slink into Ron's room and do something which was unthinkable to him as a child. He will ask to be taken care of.

Sometimes, it is Ron who opens his door quietly and steps in with a guilty face and a hopeful voice, usually saying something along the lines of, "Mind if I join in? I might go mad if I'm alone."

Harry will always nod and scoot over, just as Ron will.

Hermione visits often.

She might as well be an inhabitant of the house with the amount of time she spends at the Burrow.

Her clothes are in Ginny's closet, her toiletries are in the restroom, her paperwork is strewn over Harry's desktop more often than not.

Harry has never doubted Hermione's strength, but he is reminded of it every time he sees her focus as she pours over one case after another.

She had chosen law school. Said she needed to save people from the aftermath of the war. Said there were injustices to be dealt with.

Harry had never been so proud.

Harry had seen her fall apart, had seen her wail and cry and come close to quitting, but here she is. Pushing through, against all odds.

When she broke up with Ron, soon after the war, she had told him she wanted to focus on her career.

Ron, who'd loved her but been her friend first, understood.

Hermione had told Harry after, in the quiet room which used to be Bill's but has become Harry's, that she'd done it half for him and Harry would have fallen to his knees if not for her quick reflexes. He had cried into her robes.

"Hermione, you deserve happiness." Harry had said, his first decipherable sentence.

Hermione had laughed softly and crouched over him to rub his back. "Don't worry about me. I know what I'm doing. I think Ron and I both rushed into it, the war is hectic and it had left us desperate for any distraction. I don't think I really wanted more than friendship, and I know now that I want a career more than I want a romantic relationship. I've got enough drama being your friend."

Harry hadn't much believed Hermione then, but he sees it now.

Hermione comes alive when she's working, her eyes brighten and her shoulders straighten. She seems taller, larger, less grieved.

Harry can wring laughter out of her and force her to eat and try to make her forget what she's done and what's been done to her, but nothing can bring her more peace than working.

Hermione immerses herself in her studies, in her work, and she begins to cope.

Hermione tells him she's been seeing a mind healer and Harry nods, but does not respond.

Ron tells him Aurors require weekly therapy sessions.

When Ron and Hermione stop being awkward around each other and the three begin meeting in the evenings for tea, they both suggest Harry find some way to heal and move on.

Harry is adamant and refusing for all of one week before he gives in.

The next week, he schedules an appointment.

This does not solve everything, but after a while, Harry feels a bit less terrified of the world.

Ron helps.

He is there in the morning, boiling water for tea, and there in the night, giving Harry earnest eyes as he wishes him good sleep.

Harry aches, because Ron is too good for him.

Harry is damaged, he's been pulled apart and reassembled messily, he feels inadequate and unworthy of Ron.

Ron, who is so painfully beautiful, so kind and wonderful.

There has never been a more beautiful sound than Ron's laugh. The trembles and booms of his voice as his joy echoes off stone walls, the clench of his eyes and the gaping portal of his mouth, leading into a world better than the one Harry must live in.

There has never been a place safer than between Ron's sturdy arms and under his chin. When Ron holds him, Harry does not feel like fragments of a person, Harry feels safe and whole, 

Harry is wretchedly in love, so terribly and horribly infatuated.

Love twists between his bones and squeezes his throat, it infests his mind and burns his skin.

Harry is hyper aware of each movement Ron makes, of each slight touch Ron bestows upon his skin, of each look Ron sends his way.

Sometimes, Harry wishes to disappear if only not to suffer that glaring gaze of Ron's. 

Most times, he wishes Ron will never look away.

But just as love grows within Harry, so does guilt. 

_Ron needs a friend from me, not a lover._ Harry reminds himself often.

Foolish of Harry to assume his heart will heed his wishes.

So, Harry begins avoiding Ron and he throws himself into the reparation of Hogwarts. 

The professors become new to him once again, he no longer sees them with the gilded filter of his youth. They have shed the light which once adorned them and now they are mere wizards, just like him. They become his friends, too. 

Harry learns and grows under their wings and alongside fellow volunteers. 

Harry sees the new wave of Hogwarts students studying in rooms with crumbled walls and half-ceilings. Harry sees students rushing about, their faces bright with a joy long lost to him. 

When Professor McGonagall asks him to sit in on a lesson for Defence Against the Dark Arts, Harry has half the mind to refuse, but he agrees just as he always does.

As he eases answers out of hesitant children and sees their eyes light with understanding, Harry feels understanding bloom in his own chest.

_This is where I belong._

Professor McGonagall begins helping him plan as soon as he confides his epiphany in her. He must earn a degree, he will have to apprentice under someone, he must study more, he will not be refused anything (The Boy Who Lived could never be refused anything, after all, except maybe peace and a good night's sleep) but he must work to earn it.

Harry almost bursts with excitement, true excitement for the future, for the first time in a long time.

Not even this is enough to quell the heartache of his and Ron's now stilted relationship. Harry has spent weeks skirting around Ron, not so subtly, and Ron has grown sullen and petty.

Harry, although pained to see Ron so visibly upset, is endeared by Ron's incessant pouting. Twice in a row, Ron has stolen Harry's cup of tea and stared at him, daring Harry to speak up.

Harry can not deny Ron for long, he must indulge him.

So, one sweltering evening, Harry seeks Ron out and finds him in his bedroom. Harry knocks once before entering.

Ron says nothing but watches him with sharp eyes.

"Sorry." Harry blurts.

"For avoiding you."

Ron rolls his eyes and beckons him closer. Harry shuts the door behind him and walks further into the room dutifully.

"Just sit down, mate, no hard feelings."

Harry sighs with relief and plops himself down on Ron's old couch. Ron stands from his bed to sit next to Harry, uncharacteristically hesitant with eyes tracing Harry as if afraid Harry might bolt.

As if Harry could ever leave Ron.

"Just," Ron starts, pauses, then curses frustratingly, and tries again, "Why do you do this?"

"Do what?" Harry asks dumbly.

"This. You avoid me, then act like nothing, then you do it again. Is it something I've done? Is it the nightmares again? Because if it is, I'll not let it-"

"No. You-I, I...no, it's not that."

Harry breathes in deeply, out of the corner of his eye, he sees Ron peering at him with a concerned expression.

Harry feels all his fears, old an new, consume him for a second.

_You'll ruin your friendship,_

_He'll hate you._

_This isn't worth it._

_Who will you run to next?_

_Who will take you in?_

_No one truly loves you._

A voice that sounds suspiciously like Aunt Petunia, _Freaks like you don't get to love_.

Harry has let the fears eat him alive for years on end. Today, he lets them slide off his skin as if they were mere rainwater.

 _He's your friend, he loves you, even if it's not the way you want him to._ Harry tells himself and hopes, so much it hurts, that he's not wrong.

"I'm in love with you."

The words spill out his mouth before he can contain them.

Harry braces himself for the blow and receives a warm embrace.

Ron's scent covers him, sweet and sour and true. Harry breathes it in desperately and feels his eyes burn with tears.

Harry sniffs and Ron squeezes him tighter.

"Would-would you please say something?"

Ron pulls back to smile blindingly, his own face streaked with tears. 

"I love you too, Harry. I'm so bloody in love it's made a fool of me. Have been since forever. Please don't ever leave me again, or else the other Aurors will never forgive me for crying about The Boy Who Lived on Friday pub nights."

Harry laughs, wet and choking, and euphoric.

"I'm not joking, you prat," Ron says, his voice so soft it melts into Harry's ears.

Still, Harry can't stop laughing. Happiness swells in his chest, he feels it tingling in his fingers and tastes it on his tongue. When was the last time he felt so _good_?

Ron opens his mouth, probably to complain, but Harry steals the words off his lips. 

There is nothing left to hurt for, nothing left to fight for, there is nothing left but peace.


End file.
